ART-PRESENTATION: Tarik Kiswanson-Flowers for my father

Tarik Kiswanson’s work reflects on the influences of one culture upon another as well as the active role the viewer’s play in the creation of the work’s meaning. Through quasi-abstract sculptures, or “reductions” as he calls them, Kiswanson examines notions of nonconformity and subverts the ways in which form is perceived and registered.

By Efi Michalarou
Photo: Carlier|Gebauer Gallery Archive

In “Flowers for my father” Tarik Kiswanson’s solo exhibition at Carlier|Gebauer Gallery in Berlin the works on display are almost solely made in polished brass and steel, the viewer’s body appears obliterated, disjointed, or doubled. Razor sharp and infra-thin, his paradoxical objects are also highly responsive to their spatial environment and to their observer’s proximity as they vibrate with the displacement of air generated by the spectators circulation within the space. Kiswanson’s practice seeks to translate this idea to the level of perception. A feeling of instability pervades interactions with the artist’s works: highly sensitive to their context, his sculptures respond to their spatial environment by multiplying, refracting, and reflecting their viewers and the surrounding architecture. The exhibition takes dreams, visions, and spatial sensations from childhood as its starting point. A series of slender, highly polished steel sculptures are suspended from the gallery ceiling. Extending nearly to the floor, these hollow cocoon-like structures appear to levitate. Kiswanson calls his new series of suspended works “Vestibules”, a term that refers both to the structure of the organ in the inner ear that regulates vision and balance as well as to architectural antechambers. These organic forms constantly vibrate and rotate. Their shapes are derived from elements of Roman and Islamic architecture, as well as small mechanical pieces used in motor engines. Called “Father Forms”, these new sculptures obliquely reference the artist’s father, who as a teenager served in the Jordanian Army repairing engines and ventilation systems before exiling to Sweden two decades later where he initially found work in a metal factory and was an avid weekend gardener. The razor thin vertical lines of these suspended forms at times recall sharp, foreboding flower bulbs, evoking the contrast between the heat of mechanical work in the desert and flowers in a cold, Scandinavian landscape. Unlike previous sculptures, the new metal works beckon you to enter them. Each “Father Form” becomes a sort of portal, a vessel for a trance-like experience. Upon entering, the spectator will become multiplied, obliterated, and disjointed by the multiple reflections. This sensation is amplified by the profound sonority of the work. These sculptural vessels blur the boundaries between inside and outside, opening and enclosure, the individual and the collective.

Info: Carlier|gebauer Gallery, Markgrafenstraße 67, Berlin, Duration: 16/11-18/11/17, Days & Hours: Tue-Sat 11:00-18:00, www.carliergebauer.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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